You know that old saying “be careful what you wish for?” I do. Maybe I should’ve tried to listen better. It seemed like the worst thing that could happen was being alone forever. I still think that. It’s just… that idea’s being tested now. I'm sure part of it just comes from being with someone new. You spend tons of time alone and you get to thinking that's the only way life ought to be. Then you add in somebody new, and they expect something completely different. It's an adaptation process for both of us.

Cloudy Skies has different priorities, I think that much is clear just in the “name” she chose for herself. Far be it from me to judge the coping mechanisms of someone with a history of abuse. What works for her works for her. I know we're just getting to know each other, but I want her to feel safe around me. I want her to feel like I care about what she has to say. That's why... well, you'll see.

It actually started off pretty nice. It feels like waking up earlier has been easier (I haven’t needed my alarm in three days), but Sky was up even earlier than me. When I woke up, it was to fresh omelets. Well, as fresh as omelets will ever be. They still smelled as good as I remember, and she was already eating hers, so…

I wish I’d been awake to see her cook. Maybe I could’ve learned something about how to use hooves if she can somehow break eggs without getting any shell into what we’re eating after only a week of having these stupid bodies. Granted, this might be one of the few refrigerators that isn’t at this moment filled with rotting food, thanks to having been on constantly since the Banishment. Since the Vanishing. Since the… thing that happened. Since the Event.

If we hadn’t both been sitting like children barely tall enough to reach the table, maybe we could’ve forgotten entirely about how stupid things had become. Well… and eating had been easier. I’ve been avoiding sit-down meals like this for this exact reason: I have no idea how to use silverware.

Cloudy Skies has a solution, and that seems to be extreme patience. You can use a knife or a fork with both front hooves together if you go slow. So she would make a single cut, then put the knife down and take the fork to pick up the piece she’d just cut, then repeat. When I asked her how she'd had the time to figure this out, she looked at me like I was crazy. I guess she hasn't been bending down to eat from her plates and bowls like a dog. What, you think I did that? Why on earth would I do that? Oh, cuz' I have no hands. That's why.

We talked about what we would do to survive. I told her about the plans I’d been making, about how I wanted to make some sort of vehicle we could drive, that way we could start transporting in supplies from all over. For whatever reason, the highways didn’t appear to be clogged with broken cars, so we ought to take advantage of that fact. Told her about the garden I’d like to start, and my eventual plans to explore the country searching for additional survivors.

Sky thought my ideas were okay, though she had one of her own I thought didn’t make much sense. She wanted to save some farm animals. She’s probably right that if we didn’t do something soon, all the work humans have been doing to domesticate them all will go to waste. Chickens could never survive in the wild, though goats and cows probably would. She talked about it like it was her humanitarian responsibility, like it had been tearing her up inside all week that she hadn't been able to go.

Sky is apparently passionate about… food? Animals? I can’t tell which, honestly. She hasn’t said anything that would make me think she was a vegan or even a vegetarian before all this started. Still, the thing that she thought was our most urgent goal was saving some farm animals.

I can’t say this didn’t completely baffle me. Farm animals? Most of which would be bigger than us, maybe stronger too? Does she even know how to take care of them? Or how much more food we will need?

Apparently she had thought about all of that. She grew up on a farm, or near one, or something… and she thinks we ought to have at least cows and chickens, for the milk and the eggs. She said that taking care of them would be her responsibility, but she needed my help to get them here. We needed to hurry, since they would already be in desperate need of food by now. I didn't argue, even though I thought it was dangerous to leave the city the same day we tried driving.

Did she know where we could find some? Yes, apparently. About thirty miles outside of the city. God only knew there was a farm thirty miles away from downtown Los Angeles.

Of course, walking was out. Thirty miles might be doable for experienced backpackers with a human stride, but not for tiny horses. Sorry, ponies. Sky tells me tiny horses are called ponies. When I asked her if ponies came in blue, she only stuck her tongue out at me.

So we couldn’t walk. More than that, we would need a way to get the animals back here. She said the cows could graze just fine on people’s lawns until she found somewhere to keep them, but that we would need to take care of the chickens. Apparently they aren’t picky eaters, so she didn’t think it would be a problem.

How, you ask, are we supposed to get farm animals thirty miles in just one day? Good question. I wondered about that too.

By truck, as it turned out. Sky suggested that, together, we might be able to drive one of those big animal transport trucks. One of us could sit on the ground and operate the pedals, and the other could stand in a seat and use the wheel and the shifter.

I pointed out that driving a semi-truck is much harder than just driving stick, that it requires special training and certifications and everything. Did I have any of those? No. But I had driven them around our parking lot back at the garage.

It didn’t matter if we went slow; even chugging down the highway at parking lot speed would be faster than walking. Maybe fast enough to get the animals.

I caved. Partly because I felt bad about all the animals that would be dying right now in the wake of humanity’s death. We would be able to help at least a few of them this way. Not to mention that, should we ever wish to return to anything like a normal life, we would need milk and eggs to bring back western cooking. It wasn’t as though chickens and dairy cows make for great company, but having them around would probably make things feel less dead (and more like the Little House on the Prairie).

I’d walked past a truck several times with one of those animal trailers. Had to break into the cab, but I know the little hiding places many truckers use to hide their spare keys. Took my laptop along for the trip, since we anticipated spending the night at this farm, and then coming back tomorrow with whatever animals we find. Also brought a radio, in case this long journey through LA and beyond would expose us to more survivors.

I’m not sure what steps others would be taking to find humanity other survivors after the… event… but I’m pretty sure that, like us, just about anyone would want to. Being alone for the rest of your life is a terrifying prospect.

Sky operated the pedals and I took care of the shifting and steering. Naturally, Huan wanted to come along. Sky was more than a little nervous to have such a big dog around, but he sat in the back of the cab and stuck his head out the window, like he do.

Driving worked well enough at low speeds and with nobody else on the road, though I wouldn’t have wanted to try it on pre-event road conditions. Though it might’ve been worth it to see the look in the police officer’s face when they pulled over a pair of tiny horses driving a stolen farm truck.

The farm Sky knew about proved to be more than thirty miles after all, though not by much. North, in that part of the county I rarely visited. We listened to the radio and looked for signs of life the whole way (never broke 30, so I had plenty of time to appreciate the “scenery”). We saw and heard nothing the whole way.

We made it. Small farm was about a mile off a main road. I didn’t dare drive a truck on a dirt road, so we parked it on the highway and walked that distance. I left most of the farm stuff to Sky, though she needed my help more than once to lift something or open a latch or whatever. We fed the chickens, but just released the bigger stuff. They didn’t have pigs or goats, just maybe a dozen dairy cows, a few bulls, and a handful of horses. Some chickens. No sheep, which I think is a shame.

It was a surreal experience. I’m not sure if humans experience this when they go onto the farm, but… I swear those animals were looking at us. That doesn’t sound weird; of course they were. But… it’s very hard to explain. It felt like…

God, if I’d known animals were this smart, I never would’ve eaten any. I’ve seen pictures of animals before, and they never look like this. Never looked so… damn… smart. Like they fully realized the situation they’d been in and felt genuine gratitude that we had come for them and trust that we would take care of them.

I’ve heard about animals being loyal to their masters. Shepherds and sheep come to mind. We’re not these animals’ masters, though. Hell, we’re not even the same species as their masters. I half expected them to talk to us; would’ve just figured that becoming tiny horses would impart all the secrets of the beasts.

Well that didn’t happen. They made all the regular animal sounds, though I swear they were feeling the exact same emotions that people would’ve in their situation. This isn’t right. This can’t be right.

I had a dog growing up, and he was not this smart. Loving, loyal… but not like this. More of what I’ve seen from Huan, when we were attacked. Not natural.

The horses were just another level of surreal. It isn’t as though we have any use for bigger, stronger, faster versions of ourselves. They didn’t stick around like the cows after we let them go, and they didn’t talk to us. Course they didn’t. Horses can’t talk. They can’t drive trucks either.

I can’t say I was happy to be around them. I was afraid the stallions might try something; I’ve heard about how fierce and unruly some of those animals could be. Would we smell like horses to them?

Apparently not. I thought I smelled like a horse, but smelling an actual barn has convinced me that the alien “ponies” we’ve become are only similar to horses. It’s a much milder smell than the genuine article.

No power out here, and I want to save some battery for tomorrow in case the return trip takes more than one day.

All the farm animals becoming sapient... that's actually a horrible thing to imagine in A's world. That would mean that right now tens or hundreds of thousands of persons are trapped in pens, barns or even factory farms. *shudder*And I got the feeling that at least at some level Cloudy was aware of that fact... even before they got to the farm and actually experienced it. Sticking by my theory that she at least wasn't a normal human before The Event. OR maybe just a pegasister (which isn't a contradiction, I guess), with an awful background.I'm probably reading way, way too much into this.. but mysterious mystery is fun :)

Hmm. The animals seem to have been uplifted to an Equestrian level. Or, at least, they're in the process. The cows and sheep aren't speaking, but everything seems much more aware than it could be. That, or A's anthropomorphizing them. Either or, or maybe even a bit of both.

Also, I see I was wrong about Cloudy Skies. Now that she's with someone else, she seems to have cleared up nicely. Plus, she's providing a much needed second perspective. Alone, A was surviving. With Cloudy, he's come closer to living. Now, let's see if they can make the transition to thriving...

He needs to set up a BEACON. Wind-driven reflectors by day; a searchlight or two by night. That way any other survivors will be able to see it and zero in on them. (even if they can't travel by night it will let them know where to look.) Maybe even set up a regular smoke signal. Use a steel barrel as a drum; pound on it for a while every afternoon in a regular rhythm (something recognizable as intelligent. You'll get tired of "we will rock you" but it's recognizable....) Anyone within earshot (which can be miles) will be clued in to their existence.

Take spray paint (preferably in neon and/or glow in the dark) and paint arrows everywhere he goes, pointing back to the sanctuary. There are wingdings you can use that put handles on spray cans and hold stencils in front of them so you can do it single-handed (or hooved in their case.)Or even easier, day-glo stickers or reflective duct tape.

The battery powered speakers are clever--- but heavy and use up batteries. Scrounge an air horn or three. Carry those instead. They can scare off animals, signal people to your presence AND help you find one another if you get separated. (Walkie talkies are good, too.) Carry mace as well, and a taser or cattle prod would be a good idea. but continue working on a way to carry firearms--- there are tripods and such that could let them treat a shotgun or rifle as a mounted weapon.

As long as you have electricity, raid the electronics store. Lots of low power long endurance tools and toys there. Go Pro cameras make for lovely additions to security, for instance--- and one mounted on a toy plane gives you a way to scout the terrain WAY ahead.

Transportation? For short hops, snag one of those electric mobility scooters from a department store, or even a golf cart. It won't make you much faster but it will save wear on your hooves and let you carry more than the little wagon (especially the golf cart.... they're routinely used by security staff and maintenance crews.) For protection you can put a chicken wire cage around the seat, and scavenge one of those solar panels to use as a roof and to increase range. (Why electric? Because gasoline only lasts about a year.) The added advantage is that mobility scooters have all their controls (forward, reverse, etc) in the handles.... no pedals to reach. Not sure if golf carts are the same way, but as to that simple hand controls are available. or could be easily rigged up. Either way, there should be at least a few thousand handicap-usable vehicles in a city the size of LA.

Hope the Sanctuary has a fence around the yard! Put in some security-- drop-down 2x4 door bars, bars over the windows, maybe protect your solar panels with some chicken wire and plastic sheeting (airborne hostiles with rocks.) Not everypony is going to be friendly. Some will be downright crazy, as in stabbity-stabbity crazy. Locks on your doors aren't exactly passe just yet.

Don't forget the toys. FUN is a vital necessity as much as food. You need ways to unwind, reduce stress, and keep your brain flexible. Get a LOT of different board games, and a game console (with a solar power pack) wouldn't be a bad idea. Take time to do stuff just for fun.

You're in LA. raid a radio station. If you can get the power running with a generator, you'll increase your range a thousandfold.

Hit a library. drag home all the books you can load. Don't stop going back till you have 'em all, frankly.

6036631 Turning into Equestria? I dunno. It's still possible to write off the different perception of the animals as being part of the inherent "firmware" of ponies. "A little closer to earth" or something like that.

Yeah, I guess that theory is a lot more plausible, but when weather can be regulated or Hydra's, Manticore's and Cocatrices start popping up, I have the right to say I freaking called it.And if they have such a deep connection to animals... why did the dogs try to take a bite of 'A' that one time?

It seemed like the worst thing that could happen was being alone forever. I still think that. It’s just… that idea’s being tested now.

Cloudy Skies has different priorities,

Saw this coming from a mile away. Suspected it from the first radio broadcast, was pretty sure within a paragraph or two of them meeting.

Defeatist attitude, no thought to the future, no attempt to shore up a home base of some sort VS someone with a can-do attitude, plans for the future, and who is actively making a home base.

She's the kind of person that would get munched in pretty short order in the zombie apocalypse, unless she got really, really lucky.

On a side note:

she can somehow break eggs without getting any shell into what we’re eating after only a week of having these stupid bodies.

I have no idea how to use silverware.[...]she would make a single cut, then put the knife down and take the fork to pick up the piece she’d just cut, then repeat. When I asked her how she'd had the time to figure this out, she looked at me like I was crazy.

She wanted to save some farm animals.[...]She talked about it like it was her humanitarian responsibility, like it had been tearing her up inside all week that she hadn't been able to go.[...]She hasn’t said anything that would make me think she was a vegan or even a vegetarian before all this started. Still, the thing that she thought was our most urgent goal was saving some farm animals.

[...]but not for tiny horses. Sorry, ponies. Sky tells me tiny horses are called ponies. When I asked her if ponies came in blue, she only stuck her tongue out at me.

From the previous chapter:

She wouldn’t give me her name, at least, not her real one. She said that she hated that person, and it’d be better for everybody if she had “died with the rest of them”. She wanted me to call her “Cloudy Skies” instead, after the pair of depressingly gray clouds on her butt.

She also didn’t bother to wear anything, saying “animals don’t bother, and that’s all we are now.”

I talked about all the nice things my home base has going for it, and she seemed to get convinced pretty quick.

As I had thought, her radio looked old and broken and she didn't really know how to use it.

She agreed, and actually didn't mention being human or anything about the world before during our long walk back. My questions were met with obfuscation or simple confusion, though she wanted to know all about my work at the garage and my plans for the house here in town.

Has anyone else been getting the vibe that she isn't who/what she seems to be? Everything I learn about her smacks of a bad actor who only knows part of their role. She has odd gaps in her knowledge. Her priorities are so off that they'd be laughable if I wasn't creeped out. She knows something. She seems to know that the animals are becoming sapient, but her behaviour and supplies indicates that she didn't venture out much before A found her.

I'll be edging into epileptic tree territory here, but my theory is that, based on the dream he had and all of her oddities, this is some Conversion Bureau-type bullshit and she's either a plant, a badly informed spy, a living lure for him, or somepony that accidentally got left behind when they did whatever the fuck they did. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but knowing what I know, not what A knows, I wouldn't trust her as far as I could throw her.

Granted, it's possible she's just a really unhinged and really impractical person. The kind of person that would right an overturned pitcher of water when the Titanic was sinking. Her skills in eating and cooking with a pony body could be explained by patience and incredibly skewed priorities.

What I'm really interested in is how well she moves. Unless she has some sort of ability to adapt super quick, she should have a harder time moving than A does, by a significant amount. He's been in motion constantly, constantly figuring out how to best walk and, to some degree, climb. She's been holed up in an apartment, scavanging minimal supplies. She simply shouldn't be able to move around as well simply from having less practice at it, and since A still has problems with it . . .

If she flies even once then I'll take that as proof that she's been a pony her entire life and that she is, for whatever reason, badly pretending to have been a human.

I love Cloudy Skies already. A little cuckoo, but I think she pulls her own weight. A has been thinking about survival in the now, but having chickens, cows and knowing how to cook are important for a decent after; when all the milk and eggs have spoiled, and you're sick of eating processed food and veggies.

I wonder why A wanted to get sheep. Furthermore I wonder why he didn't ask Cloudy Skies if she thought the animals were acting differently.

I adore how they've already got team building exercises going. Ever tried driving while someone else had contol over the pedals? Me neither, outside of video games at least.

Again with the tons of updates. X.x6034787I think knowing she was able to fly would be a huge benefit for Sky's happiness (particularly with most pegasi's general attitude about flying). However, we haven't seen any evidence that she can yet. Unless she's actively concealing it from A, a fact like that definitely would've made it in. That said, there's nothing stopping her from hiding it. She's already hiding so much about herself.

6034946A does not have a cutie mark yet, yeah. A would've talked about it after meeting Cloudy Skies if that was true.

6035024Yeah, I could tell you right now if that sort of thing happens within a week (I've got more than that already written, since I edit in week-long chunks), but it would be totally unfun. I could say who Cloudy Skies really is and what happened on earth, and whether A can put it back to normal. I could tell you A's gender and proper name too. That would just be lame. Super lame. Super duper lame.

6035062I say this alot, but you won't have to wait long! When I said daily updates, I committed to it. There's a little more to read each day. It's just as much for me as for any reader, though. Means I have to write daily, which is great practice AND it lets me learn what's happening at about the same pace everyone else is (just about a week and a half in advance). I won't say whether or not Equestria is really post-apocalpytic or not, but others have shared that theory with you. I can promise you'll know if that theory is true by the end of the story, though.

6035349Hah, if I named ponies to get the alphabet, I would totally name the next character (if they ever exist) with a B name. UNFORTUNATELY. Would be funny though. Sky doesn't seem down enough to try offing herself, but that doesn't mean she wouldn't be that badly off in the future. Trying to fly after that is actually a neat idea. If Sky ever tries it, you'll know who thought of it first. ^^

6035445I've never really considered the "sticky hooves" thing to be one of those explicit cannon things. Sorta like the mysterious golden magic that levitates Applejack's ticket in the beginning of the series, or the arcade machines and movie theaters that appear in musical numbers but seem not to jive with the level of technology otherwise. Or lots of what pinkie pie does. Presented this way though, it's very interesting, and to me moves down into the realm of things that might actually be possible. I don't know if they'll ever appear, but if Sticky Hooves do, I'll know how to portray them now.

6035485No, it won't. Learning to fly is hard enough for birds, who seem to come pre-made with all the instincts. Unless pegasai have some of those (which it's hard to be certain about with the show's evidence, baby cakes not withstanding), it would probably take many hours of trial just to get off the ground. That after somehow getting the confidence to try it at all.

6035499Maybe with all these side-stories people are apparently starting, someone will write one from the perspective of a normal dog made somehow smarter after the Event changed everything. Story from the perspective of the dog would be quite fascinating. Granted, it would probably be pretty hard to write with any feel of authenticity. I couldn't do it. So far as editing goes, I don't think I'll explicitly say I'm making a change (though I will say when I like an idea and might use it in unwritten stuff). I think it takes some of the magic away from me to say "edited this chapter to take X's suggestion" or whatever. Still, I don't try to hide it, so it should be fairly clear.

Although there were instances where future events already conformed to predictions, so it kinda looked like I was taking suggestions when it just so happened people had come up with the same ideas I did a week before.

6035534Also true that there are many other races in the show besides the three. I'm probably not going to use any races pre gen-4, but I make no promises not to use all the material given by the current generation.

6035788Ponygeddon is a really neat word. I almost named the group after it, in fact. Almost. Except for the kindof implication that the ponies were somehow directly responsible for the -geddon, which isn't one I want to make. People might interpret it that way, but I don't want to say so explicitly.

6036044And none of them appear to have experience herding cattle as horses themselves. That probably makes things harder. Just cuz Applejack can do it doesn't mean an average pony can, let alone a transformed one.

6036051It's true, though if you believe the marketing for Chick-fil-A, it's the cows who are plotting (quite sensibly) to have us eat more chicken. Granted, if I ever saw a cow painting a sign telling me not to eat beef, I probably never would. Freakin' sapient animals.

6036071Yeah, not sure how those errors snuck in. Fixed 'em earlier, even though I didn't get a chance to hit up the day's comments yet.

6036103Man that freaky, freaky show. Good thing Huan is braver than that dog, that's all I can say.

6036123Well pound for pound I bet humans still would've killed more chickens than they ever killed of us. Though... I guess all that matters in the end is whose left standing, so I guess humans still lost in that situation)

6036128She can barely operate a radio. Not to confirm or deny anything about her. She did say she wished she'd died with the rest of them, but that doesn't necessarily even require lying to still be true if she wasn't human.

6036190Which came first, Cloudy Skies, or everybody being suspicious of the first sapient character besides the narrator? >.>

6036195But she has to know how to fly in order to do that! Unless she's hiding things from A, I don't think she can. She might be lying, or she might just not know. Guess that depends on what you believe about her. Lots of people think she's evil or something.

6036310Yeah, thanks for pointing those out. I did my best to fix the mistakes, even though I didn't have time to respond to everypony's comments until just now.

6036513Hey, I'm not being ambiguous! I have everything about A right here on this character notes page. Age, sex, name, history... it's all here. Oh, right. Nobody can see that but me. Whops.

6036572Yeah, I think I could do pretty well in an isolation situation so long as I knew I could get to people if I wanted them. Better than the average person, anyway. But... studies are pretty consistent that isolation is one of the most severe forms of torture a person can be subjected to. Us introverts are the minority.

6036597Well that interpretation of Cloudy Skies is more favorable than some I've read about in these comments so far. Of course, I won't say whether any of those interpretations have been right or wrong, but... at least yours seems to treat her like she's being genuine. Difficult, but who isn't after the ponypocalypse?

6036603Even humans seem to depend on having company to do well. Ponies in the show, much moreso. Friendship is magic. That alone indicates this development is going to be positive for all (new) ponies involved.

6036648I enjoy TCB and its many stories, including Chatoyance's work. I'm not trying to tell her stories, though. She can do that better than I can.

6036785Woah, huge comment! Some well-thought out, survival-optimal choices right there. Almost makes me feel like you've got a genuine disaster survival background. I think A's chances of lasting the year would be doubled or tripled with your kind of advice. Unfortunately, I don't really have a good way of passing it on yet. Nobody in the story (or nopony, I should say) has that kind of specialized knowledge. A was an auto mechanic, not any kind of survivalist, nor part of any other organization (Boy/girl scouts (do girl scouts even teach survival), church groups for it, whatever. A would probably see the practicality of those suggestions in an instant.

Now maybe if A ever runs into a book about preparedness, or a pony who used to be a prepper or something, that might do it. I can confirm the house has a fence, but it was also in a ritzy part of town, so there were no bars or any other security measures. Just a metal and stone fence about ten feet high around the property. Of course, A would be free to do any of those things, assuming a lone pony can figure out how to install bars and things and replace doors.

We can certainly expect to see A doing more survival things in the time to come. Maybe even some of those things. We'll just have to see how the story develops. ^^

6036820Earth ponies in particular seem to have a connection. Granted, Fluttershy's talent is animals, so clearly the other tribes can do it too...

6036849Well if they could talk, I'm sure A could become good friends with the chickens. It's not like ponies would ever kill them when they couldn't lay eggs anymore. Well, not based on the evidence from the show. Also, that movie was awesome. I love how many awesome female characters it had doing adventury things. Seemed rare at the time in "kid's" movies.

6036856Clearly the narrator's special talent has nothing to do with animals. X.x

6038319WE FOUND THE MISSING HUMANS! XD. Wait, then what happened to the animals?

6038371I don't think it was the same kinda talking that Fluttershy did, but... maybe...

6038391Holy crud huge comment. Lots and lots of spoiler tags, too. Yes, it's clear Cloudy's one of those doomed to an early death if it wasn't for the help of good friends. A good thing for her that A found her. In her defense, she seemed to know this in her radio broadcasts. Now, I'm going to respond to this huge message as best I can without confirming or denying anything as much as possible, because of course I think spoiling future events is lame and makes the story lame too. That said, there are some things I want to state explicitly, to avoid misunderstanding at this (very early) stage of the story.

I won't say what caused the disappearance of humans, one way or the other. Maybe A will learn that one day, maybe not. But I will say I'm not telling a Conversion Bureau story. If I wanted to do that (and I probably will at least once, I think the genre has left much of the good about humanity unsaid), I would've just done so explicitly. I'm not reinventing those stories or writing some kind of indirect sequel to them. Are Equestrian ponies directly or indirectly responsible for what's going on on earth? Maybe. But this isn't TCB, particularly any one person's TCB.

Could you be right about Cloudy, though? Maybe! Maybe not. That I can promise an eventual answer for. ^^

6038841I'm glad at least somebody does! I like really flawed characters, and Cloudy is certainly that. The narrator is too, but that part doesn't come off as well when you're the one narrating your own life. We do tend to fail to notice our own faults and exaggerate our successes. Having another character around gives me a mirror I can use to show the narrator their own faults as well as see how other people live post-disaster.

6038977 Actually, I'm NOT a survivalist. No experience whatsoever. Though I have read enough books and seen enough movies and TV shows that I can get in that mindset easy, I suppose. Most of the things I listed, I just noodled up while sitting there.

And really, who HASN'T done the whole Zombie Apocalypse Survival fantasy thing? (proud owner and reader of the Zombie Apocalypse Survival Guide.) "A" doesn't even have the zombies to worry about! Plus, he's not competing with other looters... every store is loaded. The biggest risk is keeping greed from jumping on his head and leading him to ruin.

The real biggie is the "lighthouse." He went to all that trouble to build a radio, but at some point it HAS to occur to him that the likelihood of another "pony person" having a working radio and even being able to turn it on are incredibly slim. In fact it seems to have already dawned on him to some degree, so the next step seems obvious. (facehoof, followed by putting a spotlight on the roof.)

As to barring the doors and windows, he's already assembled a RADIO which requires hella more dexterity. He can wingle a soldering iron and a screwdriver, he can handle a hammer. Besides which, his sanctuary is, by his own description, designed to be off the grid. This says "survivalist mentality" owners. If they don't have a complete set of cordless power tools in the garage, including air compressor and attachments (such as an air hammer), it'd be a huge oversight. Heck, even non-survivalists tend to have a complete garage full of tools. Even I, low income near-bum that I am, have a middling decent box of tools, including some crappy battery powered ones. failing that, everything he needs is at the nearest Home Depot.

Marking your trail back home.... that's basic. Even if you don't wanna lead anyone home. YOU don't wanna get lost and LA is huge. A bit of chalk can be a lifesaver.

And maybe it's because I'm an unhealthy old fart, but I'd loot the BEJEEZUS out of the nearest drug store, from the back of the pharmacy to the chewing gum by the front register. Especially their antibiotics--- and all their medical leaflets and samples and pharma company info. Heck, most drug stores have stuff designed to make life easier for handicapped people (tools for opening jars, grippy claw things, no-slip bath mats (tile floors, hooves, think about it), that sort of thing, so he might find some particularly useful stuff there.

TAPE, ESPECIALLY DUCT TAPE IS YOUR FRIEND. YOUR GUARDIAN ANGEL. YOUR GIFT FROM JESUS. CARRY LOTS. There's even a tool for dispensing duct tape more easily...(DUCT TAPE USE #10001: BREAKING WINDOWS. Duct Tape the glass, then hit with rock or hammer. The glass sticks to the tape so you don't have shards flying everywhere.)

A cigarette lighter. One of the fancy ones that light by flipping it open. I'd get a bagful of the things though; refilling and changing the flints would be a stainless steel bitch without fingers. Still, they'd last a good long time.

NOTE: HORSESHOES ARE ACTUALLY BAD FOR HORSES. Yes, even with paved roads... the Houston mounted police keep their horses unshod despite spending all day on pavement. See, unshod, the hoof FLEXES slightly. This is necessary because it helps pump the blood back up the leg. It's visible in infrared, even: the leg of a horse with shoes will be cold and almost bloodless due to the shoe restricting the hoof. The reason a horse limps when it loses a shoe is because it's walking with full circulation for the first time in YEARS. Left shoeless, they will soon be running unshod just fine-- and in far better health than ever. Plus, the nail holes weaken the hoof and provide an entryway for infection.... a properly trimmed hoof is well protected against wear, even on hard pavement, concrete or cobblestone.Shoeing is one of those terrible things that foolish people came up with that persists long, long after wisdom should have abolished it--- like corsets, footbinding, high heels, piercings or other "fashionable" forms of self-deformation. Nothing easier than fooling people, nothing harder than getting them to admit they were fooled.

Fortunately for now it's highly unlikely that A or Cloudy Skies is going to shoe themselves. I would suspect that A would be motivated by his own reluctance to nail shit to himself would motivate him to look up pages like this early on, which I suspect would be a BIG relief and a load off his mind.http://www.barefoothorse.com/

6038977 ummm... Cluck Chuck cluck.... Cluck Cluck CLUCK!*turns back into a human*Well I have and idea... they were... actually smarter than humans, rebuilt noah's ark but for space, and set sail into the stars. Afterwards they turned all the humans into animals for revenge and to learn sympathy.

6040498It's possible, but I just can't see a girl being an auto mechanic. Also, I thought the reason our main character was glad that Sky is a girl is because then they could potentially get romantic without it being awkward.

I can’t say I was happy to be around them. I was afraid the stallions might try something;

So I'm the only one who found this to be hilarious imagery? I'm sorry, A.Just be glad you didn't get turned into a dolphin.

60383916038841I really like how 2 different readers take away completely different things from the same character. This sort of reaction spectrum is a major motivation for a procrastinating would-be FiMfic writer (me); I just imagine in what unforeseen ways ppl would comment on my characters. Man I love readers like you guys (even though you're not even my readers cuz I don't have a story lol).

60399366038977RealityCheck is right. You don't have to be a crazy survivalist to think up the things he just listed, biggest of which is RAID THE PHARMACY.You just need to be in the right mindset (like, finding yourself in the situation), and have lots of time on your hands to think about it (like, being the only ppl left on the planet).

Why do I have the strangest feeling that with the only humans currently ponies at the moment that Earth eventually becomes Equestria! That's actually one of my headcannons that Equestria is really Earth after Humans just disappeared one day ant that the show takes place thousands of years later!